Norman Cook, better known as Fatboy Slim, has been a resident of Brighton for 25 years and is a director of the town's football club, Brighton & Hove Albion. Cook was a leading figure in the 10-year campaign to find Albion a new home after the club's Goldstone Ground was demolished in 1997, a campaign that succeeded when plans for a new stadium in Falmer were approved last year.

Weren't you once a Crystal Palace fan?

I grew up there and went to games because it was part of the social life, the done thing. I was never really a fan. This was in the crazy old days of football violence - you were tough if you went to a game. I spent most of the matches trying to keep out of fights. I still have a lot of friends who are Palace fans. I think you should change teams when you change cities, particularly if you're planning to live there for a while.

Did you go to Brighton's last game at the Goldstone Ground in 1997?

Oh yeah. There was a huge amount of anger that day, at the way Bill Archer and David Bellotti [the then chairman and chief executive] had almost run us into the ground. When the club didn't make money, they sold the ground and turned it into a Toys R Us car park. I have to go there with my son and it really hurts, parking where the centre spot used to be. When people dug up the turf and took down the goalposts [after the last game], it wasn't for souvenirs, it was to vent anger.

What happened to Brighton next?

Dick Knight [Brighton's current chairman] spearheaded a group of six or seven fans who had the money to buy Bellotti and Archer out, and now we own the team. I'm a director but not on the board because I don't want to get involved with the running of the club. I get a free parking space but I don't have to go to meetings and decide who we sell.

And now you're at the Withdean Stadium...

Calling it a stadium is to over-egg it somewhat. It's an athletics track with bleachers. But when we moved in there was a tremendous surge of optimism and the ground was packed. We started winning, with Bobby Zamora scoring goals left, right and centre.

Didn't you change the name of the stadium to the name of your album at one point?

Shameless self-promotion, but sod it, Skint [Cook's record label] has spent enough money on the shirt sponsorship. My album Palookaville was coming out and Dick managed to convince the FA to let us change the name to the Palookaville Stadium. For one day only!

Do you play a lot yourself?

Not that much. I sponsor an under-16s team in Brighton called Brove United. They're my boys. Last season they had a dads vs the first XI match, and I got roped in. I couldn't walk for two days. I also played a bit in South Africa when I was there last year for Coaching For Hope, a football coaching and HIV awareness programme for orphans and street kids. Hope Powell [who coaches England's women] came out, because we were doing a course on women's coaching as well. She is a really nasty tackler. Dirty. Honestly, I had stud marks when I got home.

If Albion ever make it to another Cup final, will you write them a song?

I've been asked by the Albion and by the FA before, and I said no. I'm not a big fan of football songs. 'World In Motion' and 'Three Lions' are the only ones I'd cross the road to spit on if they were on fire. Then again there is 'The Goldstone Rap', the Cup final song from 1983. It's there in my collection, tempting me. I think about playing it every time I do a gig at Brighton Beach.

· This article was amended on September 8 2008. The youth team sponsored by Norman Cook, aka Fat Boy Slim, mentioned in OSM last week, is Brove, not Grove, United. The young players came up with the name, neatly combining Brighton and Hove. This has been corrected.